


(Super) Women in STEM

by TigerDragon



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Cisco Needs a Minute Alone, Drunkenness, F/F, In Public, Karaoke, Shipper on Deck, Superbooze, What the Hell Betsy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-09
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-11 06:49:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3318008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TigerDragon/pseuds/TigerDragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Science, booze and medical treatment are maybe not the soundest foundations for a long term relationship. On the other hand, stranger things have happened.</p><p>Especially in Central City.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“What I want to know,” Betsy Allen sighed, thumping her head gently against the headrest of the exam table, “is who leaves a tractor lying in the middle of the street in Central City. I mean, a tractor. And if they were going to do that, did they have to leave a pile of farm tools lying scattered over the road behind it? I mean, nobody thought to pick those up?”

“The flatbed overturned three seconds before you tripped,” Dr. Caitlin Snow remarked, glancing at an x-ray, deft fingers settling around Betsy’s wrist and elbow. “Which, by the way, wouldn’t have happened if you’d taken the route Cisco gave you. Don’t move,” she said in the same tone of voice, then pulled hard on Betsy’s hand, turning the arm slightly and setting the fracture back in place.

“You know, every time you say that, it winds up hurting a lot.” Betsy buried a curse against her teeth and tried very, very hard not to move or vibrate or especially run to the other end of town and dislodge any of her currently-trying-to-mend bones. “Yep. Right on cue.”

“Thank God for inflatable splints,” Caitlin remarked to no one in particular as she put one - tightly - on Betsy. “Cutting a cast off after two hours is just ridiculous.” Already paging through several screens of more x-rays and biodata, she nodded to herself. “Okay. That’s the only fracture worth worrying about. The others are probably already healed by now. I want to see how your abrasions and lacerations are doing in another half-hour - so far you can fight off infection faster than the microorganisms can reproduce, but that was a nasty set of road rash. Other than that,” she said, finally looking at Betsy again, “you just need a balanced meal and plenty of water.”

“Thanks.” Betsy tried to smile without hurting her face. She mainly succeeded at the first and failed at the second, which was a mixed blessing. “Ow. We need to stop seeing each other like this. People will talk.”

“If by ‘people’ you mean Cisco and Dr. Wells, I’m not too worried,” Caitlin said. Again avoiding the meta-human’s eyes, she peeled her gloves off and began checking over the medical supplies. “Who would they talk to? It’s not like any of us get out much.”

“Um. I suppose they could talk to each other. About how, I don’t know, I trip over things just to get you to cause me excruciating but helpful pain.” Betsy stopped herself from moving her right hand and ran her left through her short brown hair instead. “Okay, I didn’t think that joke through very well. To be fair, my arm is broken.”

Her awkward fumbling was rewarded with a half-disbelieving, half-amused snort from Caitlin. “For the next hour or so, anyway. What’s your excuse the rest of the time?”

“I was hit by lightning?”

Smiling now, Caitlin closed a cabinet. “So you’re saying you’ve always been trouble, just slower. I don’t envy Detective West.”

“Hey....” Betsy eased herself off the exam table and shuffled her feet a little, examining the (now perpetually worn and a little scorched) soles of her shoes. It wasn’t that she’d tried to be trouble, but yeah, okay, maybe a few times she’d gotten in a little bit over her head. Once or twice. A tiny bit.

Caitlin winced. “I’m sorry. Today’s not been great for me and apparently I’m sharing the pain. Hang on,” she instructed, and then was fastening a sling around Betsy’s shoulders. “Walking moves your arms more than you’d think.”

“Hey.” Betsy’s voice softened, and she tilted her head enough to give Caitlin a long look. “I’m not, y’know, upset or anything. I can be a little bit trouble. Are you okay, though?”

After securing Betsy’s arm in the sling, the doctor shrugged one shoulder. “It’s no big deal.” Splint, fine. Sling, fine. Betsy’s cooperation, A+. The shoulder strap, on the other hand, was being recalcitrant and did not want to be adjusted. She glared at it.

“Come on, you stupid piece of garbage,” she muttered.

Betsy stayed very quiet and still until the strap finally gave in, then slowly - absurdly slowly, for her - reached out and touched Caitlin’s shoulder lightly. “Berating inanimate objects is not usually a sign of not a big deal, for me. Usually it’s one step before I start contemplating how to build weapons of mass humiliation.”

Lips quirking upwards, Caitlin met Betsy’s eyes briefly before staring off to the side. “Since the explosion I haven’t felt like going out or doing other fun things, which, obviously, is a pretty standard symptom of grief and depression and normal for the first year or so. I get that.” She took a breath, then leaned back on the counter, fingers drumming nervously. “But today’s my birthday, and I’m lonely but I still don’t want to go out, and I expected Ronnie to take a lot with him but I didn’t realize casual nights out with friends were part of that. So I’m,” she gulped, tears pricking her eyes, “lonely and hurt and stupidly, uselessly angry at my dead fiancee and it’s not really appropriate for me to dump this on you but I guess we’ve left the typical doctor-patient relationship way the hell in the dust and it’s not really healthy but there’s not a whole lot we can do about it.” Taking a long, shaky breath, she closed her eyes tight for a second, then wiped a few tears away and looked at Betsy again. “So. What sort of mass humiliation?”

“I tried to science out a plan for a ray that would make everyone quack like a duck when I was twelve,” Betsy whispered, then carefully eased her way into a one-armed hug. “Though I also had an idea involving an orbital karaoke strike that seemed like a good thought at the time. Maybe we could go out and get some pizza and some soda and then work on it together?”

“Karaoke strike?” Caitlin asked, then cracked up, laughing and crying on Betsy’s shoulder. Under the circumstances, Betsy did the only sensible thing and just held on until the crying stopped. It had always worked for her before.

“Not pizza,” Caitlin sniffled, grabbing a tissue. “Thai? Also, sorry not sorry, I’ll be having a few beers.”

“I will buy you alcohol, in whatever quantity you desire, because I like my bones set properly,” Betsy said with the utmost sincerity, though it was an effort not to laugh. “Thai is good, though.”

“You’re a great patient, have I mentioned that?” Caitlin grinned. “Except for undoing my good work too often, of course.”

“Think of it as a kind of job security guarantee.” Even one-handed, Betsy got the door and Caitlin’s coat without too much trouble. Speed was unexpectedly helpful with things like catching objects before they had time to fall down.

“Stop that,” Caitlin frowned, scooping up her purse. “The sympathetic vibrations could crack the fracture open again.”

Betsy leaned back against the door and held out the coat one-handed, grinning unapologetically. “Sorry not sorry, doctor.”

They went out past the lab in silence, ducking Doctor Wells and Cisco like wayward schoolgirls, and Betsy was giggling like a lunatic by the time they actually made it out the door. From the look on her face, Caitlin wasn’t far from losing it herself.

“I bet you practiced that smile,” Caitlin accused her through suppressed chuckles. “No way you’re naturally that charming when you’re in trouble.”

“I’m only that charming when I’m in trouble,” Betsy retorted. “Totally unpracticed defense mechanism, I swear. The rest of the time I trip over my own feet.”

“Or farm equipment,” Caitlin countered, fishing out her car keys.

Whatever expression Betsy was wearing, it was worth the embarrassment to see Caitlin double over laughing before she even got the Hyundai’s door open.

 


	2. Chapter 2

Dr. Caitlin Snow was not late for work. Ever. Not once, to any job she’d ever had, from babysitting to food service all the way up to Star Labs. Nor was it just a habit of her professional life. In all her student years, she had racked up exactly one tardy - those still-begrudged ten minutes of AP Calculus she’d missed due to little sister having a dramatic breakdown over breakfast. For appointments, she always arrived at least fifteen minutes early. Even her pre-arranged phone calls with her parents never happened ‘around eight’ or ‘fiveish.’

There was sunshine streaming into Caitlin’s room on a Tuesday. She enjoyed it right before she woke up enough to panic.

The alarm clock was sitting on the nightstand, dark and silent.

“Crap crap crap,” Caitlin muttered, chewing on her lower lip. She moved through the apartment, flicking light switches that did nothing, despairing over the ruined ice cream in the freezer, and found her phone.

Which had been nearly dead before she plugged it in for the evening and was now, of course, most sincerely dead. Pursing her lips at the Motorola and the kitchen and technology in general, she dug her emergency radio out of the hall closet.

The solar panel came in handy. So did the hand crank, but she’d let the sun charge her phone while she got showered and dressed.

By some miracle of the Science Gods, she got her phone turned on five minutes before she was supposed to be at work. Being late was bad enough. A no-show was a shame not to be thought of.

“Dr. Snow?” Doctor Wells, imperturbable as ever. He was never late to work. What could she possibly say, under the circumstances, short of mea maxima culpa?

Someone knocked on her door.

She was going to get the words out first. But then they knocked again, which completely threw her off. “I’m sorry, I’ll call back in one minute,” she said. And hung up.

The phone could charge a little more.

There was an impression of green eyes and a smirk before her apartment dissolved into a crazy blur of light and sound and wind, and then she was regaining her balance and blinking at Cisco and Dr. Wells. She had, somehow, acquired a coffee holder with coffee for everyone and a bag that smelled like breakfast in the process.

“So I suppose you won’t be calling back,” Doctor Wells said.

Mouth working soundlessly, she carefully set the food and coffee on the counter.

“There was a power outage,” she finally managed. “I overslept. I had to solar-charge my phone.” Betsy, suspiciously, was not in the lab.

“Man, talk about a short commute. I wish she would pick me up for work.” Cisco, digging through the paper bag, did not look nearly as concerned as her explanation deserved. “Ooh, she got the bacon sandwiches.”

“Also the kale and acai grilled chicken wrap. We wouldn’t want to tempt Doctor Wells into an indiscretion,” Betsy Allen said from the door of the lab, a squarish silver case dangling casually from one hand.

Smiling like the proud surrogate father he was, Wells accepted the case. “Thank you, Betsy. I appreciate your consideration of my bizarre dietary practices.”

“Bizarre is right,” Cisco muttered around a mouthful of sandwich. “This temperature is perfect. I think I finally got the alloy ratios right on the Mach 2 Go.”

“You carried me to work,” Caitlin pointed out to Betsy. The tone of her voice, she felt, was very indicative of her feelings on the matter.

Betsy suddenly became very interested in the wear patterns on her shoes. “Well.... yeah. I locked your place up, and your phone’s charging in the break room?”

Caitlin felt her expression harden.

“Oh, hey, I’m gonna go calibrate the...something,” Cisco said, slinking away. Doctor Wells, who did not slink, had caught the signs earlier and had already vacated the premises.

“You carried me to work, went through my apartment, and took my keys without asking my permission,” Caitlin specified, freezing the air temperature almost palpably. Then her eyes narrowed further. “How did you know I was late, anyway? Or where I live?”

“Cisco wanted me to drop off a binder and flash drive for him once. He said you’d forgotten it at work? So I ran it over. And you usually leave around seven so you have time to eat breakfast in that park you like, and I didn’t see you there when I happened to run by, so....” Betsy trailed off and then winced, rubbing the back of her neck awkwardly. “That doesn’t make it sound any better, does it?”

“Oh my God, no! No it doesn’t!” Caitlin’s composure finally broke, and she began gesturing wildly. “Using your superpowers to stalk people is so not okay I think you might need a time out in the pipeline!”

“I wasn’t.... I mean...” Betsy flickered like a bad movie projector, arms tight around her ribs and eyes on the floor one second and hands thrown up in the middle of an exasperated gesture the next, then finally settled into a lanky girl with her head hanging and her hands shoved in her pockets. “I didn’t mean to,” she mumbled, “but yeah, I guess I kinda did.”

Caitlin deflated, arms falling and fury subsiding all at once. She hadn’t been expecting the relief to come so fast after the flight-or-fight, and that was going to bother her later. When she could remember why it was a problem. “Yeah,” she said quietly. To give herself a moment, she retrieved her coffee - dark roast, two sugars, no foam, just the way she liked it.

“I have a lot of waiting during the day. It didn’t used to bother me because it’s not very long - a few minutes while a chemical works or a few seconds while the system pulls up a file - but it drags now. And I start worrying about people - you, Cisco, Joe, other folks. So I just started checking on people. You know - zip over and make sure they’re okay. It made sense until about a minute ago, and now I feel kinda...” Betsy cleared her throat. “Um... I’m sorry. For being creepy.”

“Good. You should be,” Caitlin said half-heartedly, then sighed. “Dammit. It’s really infuriating how hard it is to be angry with you for very long,” she complained. “Especially when you do the kicked puppy face. That face should be banned from any and all arguments.”

“I’ll do my best,” Betsy said in her most solemn voice. “So how about I drop a bottle of tequila and a few DVDs by your place and we call it good?” Her arms were up and waving before Caitlin even finished turning around. “Joke! Joke! Don’t freeze gun me!”

Caitlin laughed. “I forgive you. This time.” And, okay, the cold gun had crossed her mind in the last few minutes. That Cisco had a point about being prepared. “And we can still be friends if you stop stalking me.”

“I will strictly avoid wandering through the neighborhood, peeking in, checking up on you or otherwise engaging in surveillance state-like behavior,” Betsy said, putting a hand to her heart. “I’ll even remove your address from the crime and city services tracker app on my phone.”

There was a silence of significant length. Caitlin stared at Betsy with her lower lip between her teeth. “Does the police force have a preferred therapist?” she asked, then blushed.

“I think the words you’re looking for are ‘You have issues, Allen,’” Betsy said softly, but she smiled when she said it.

“You do,” Caitlin admitted, then smiled through her embarrassment. “Not that I don’t. I’d recommend my therapist, but it would be a conflict of interest.”

Betsy grinned. “Can’t imagine why.”


	3. Chapter 3

Caitlin, being the boss she was, had gotten published again. It was the paper she’d been working on before the particle accelerator, a biochem/tech piece on an alternative method of protein folding that might enable scientists to revive burned tissue. Both grief and their lightning-struck patient had put it on a back burner for a while, so it was pretty awesome that she was going back to her original work.

Ergo, all of them needed to get their serious party on.

“The still is a machine. I’m great with machines. Just leave the instructions, it’ll be fine,” Cisco soothed Caitlin. “We’re celebrating your awesomeness. You should be off getting a massage or a mani-pedi or whatever.”

“Well...okay,” she agreed reluctantly, then smiled. “I haven’t had a massage in ages. Thanks for taking care of this, Cisco.”

“No problem.” Then she left, and Cisco played around with the super-still, made some five hundred proof and then some eight hundred proof (probably would do more throat damage than was worth the buzz, but worth a try) and then some more five hundred. Meanwhile, he called everyone - okay, like, the Flash team and two of Caitlin’s friends from Before, but that was better than nothing, right? - and made sure he had a nice-ish jacket and clean pants to wear.

It was too bad he couldn’t actually win money on bets he made with himself, because his prediction that Betsy would dress up while trying to not look like she was dressed up? Totally came true. He was just about sure she’d polished her leather jacket somehow, for one thing.

“I swear to God, if you serve me shots out of test tubes again I will personally find some way to implicate you in a felony,” she said, as if those were perfectly normal words to use as a greeting between friends. Which was surprisingly true in the new normal of Cisco’s life.

“Chill. There are shot glasses,” he reassured her. “Thought if you don’t want the crazy-strong alcohol Caitlin designed just for you, I can always use it as fuel for something.”

“She does realize I only get buzzed for a few seconds at a time, right?” Betsy sighed, then gave him a Look that was probably superpowered. “If you tell her I complained, I will make you regret it.”

“Do you, like, threaten everyone but her, or am I special?” Cisco grinned.

“Special is one way to say it.”

“Aww. Love you too, Allen.”

“Cisco,” she said, resting a hand on his shoulder and grinning fondly, “please believe me when I tell you that I would speed date the entire hemisphere before I would go out with you.”

Hands on his hips theatrically, Cisco frowned. “Man, all I do for you and you keep bashing on my ego. Don’t worry, Betsy, I might say inappropriate things now and then, but you aren’t my type, either.”

“I would say I’m hurt, except that I’m pretty sure they can hear my relief in London.” Betsy gave him a classic bro-hug across the shoulders and smiled crookedly. “But if you ever need someone to tell a girl who is your type what a great guy you are, tell me. As long as you don’t mind me telling her about the flying turtle box, too.”

“The Cowabunga Special was too good for this earth,” Cisco sighed. He very carefully did not mention Betsy’s preferred type, or that Caitlin had been more and more obvious about her thing for Betsy, or any of it. It was so not worth getting in the middle of all that.

“Okay, everything’s bottled. Gonna head out,” the engineer said, and started packing up for the day.

“Meet you there. I’m going to grab a couple of things on the way,” Betsy told him before doing the Land Speed Record Vanish. Whatever it was must have involved waiting on someone without supercruise, because he beat her to the bar and had enough time to fist-bump Caitlin over the first round of shots. She was looking happy and relaxed, and if he hadn’t just downed some Jagermeister Cisco’s warm fuzzies would have been seriously complicated by other emotions. As it was, he grinned and toasted her when the next round came up.

“So I hear that someone’s going to get a burn unit named after her someday,” Betsy said as she elbowed up to the bar with a package tucked under one arm. “Perfect victory, Doctor Snow.”

Caitlin smiled, and there was no way even a casual observer would have missed the light in her eyes when she looked at Betsy. Cisco really, really hoped that liquid courage and pretense-destroying karaoke would get them to FINALLY stop making eyes at each other and actually do something.

“Thank you, Miz Allen,” Caitlin answered.

“In honor of which, I come bearing gifts.” Betsy extracted the package from under her arm and held it out. “Something to help with your next stroke of genius.”

Caitlin took it with anticipation in her eyes and slid a thumbnail underneath one taped end. The other end wasn’t as cooperative, and Cisco grinned as she gave up on neatness and just ripped the paper off. Whether from booze or personal growth, it was good to see her cut loose.

The specimen kit inside made him want to get his hands on it and drool at the same time. It had variable temperature control for each segment, auto-sterilization, plug-ins for what were probably all sorts of data outputs, what he strongly suspected was one of the new Queen Industries kinetic power adapters....

Yeah, he needed another drink or he was going to be rude in front of people.

“Oh my god,” Caitlin was saying. “This is...it’s gorgeous. And really expensive. Please tell me you didn’t spend your rent on this.”

“A friend owed me a favor,” Betsy said, trying to play it cool. But you could see how happy she was all over her face anyway. “It was no big deal.”

“Can I touch it?” Cisco heard himself asking. Dammit. Where was the bartender when you needed him?

Caitlin, bless her, leaned out of the way so Cisco could look and, yes, touch. Notably, she didn’t release her grip even a little. That was okay. He couldn’t blame her.

Before his undisciplined arms could actually start to pry the kit away from Caitlin, Cisco finally got another drink. After waiting for the bartender to forget his existence again, he pulled the shot glass and superbooze out of his backpack.

“Here,” he called to Betsy, sliding it all over to her. “The big flask is five hundred, the small one is eight. Proceed at your own risk. After I have my timer out,” he amended, thumbing through his phone apps.

“Eight hundred?” Caitlin frowned. “That’s strong enough to damage your throat.”

Betsy eyed the flask skeptically, then shrugged. “Well, at least there’s a doctor in the house.” She unstoppered the small flask, glanced at Cisco to confirm he was waiting with baited breath and phone in hand - which he was - and then downed the whole thing in one go, which was not at all what he’d planned and he had a momentary terrible worry that she was about to collapse from massive alcohol poisoning.

“Shit,” Betsy rasped, eyes watering, as she thumped the flask down and leaned hard on the table. “Owwww. The room’s wobbling.”

Cisco winced. “So, you’re drunk?”

Caitlin’s worried expression took a break long enough for an angry glare at him.

“Hammered,” Betsy affirmed, careful of all the letters in the word while she slumped against the bar. “This is like the first time I had tequila and nobody told me about shot glasses. You have really nice shoes.”

The worry dissolved into a giggle. “Thanks,” Caitlin answered. “Okay, Cisco, this is pretty great. I think we need to do some karaoke right now. Are there any group songs?”

“Just duets, I think, but they’ll let you go up in groups,” he grinned. Another two shots appeared for him and Caitlin. The bartender gave Betsy a suspicious look, but she’d made the glass and flask disappear. Cisco wondered if they were still in the room, or somewhere else entirely; then he wondered if there probably ought to be a rule against superspeeding while drunk. After downing his drink, he whooped as Caitlin did the same with hers.

The doctor hooked her arm around Besty’s. “Come on, Allen.”

“Don’t sing in public,” Betsy protested with a distinct lack of steadiness. “Terrible idea. You’re warm....”

“Minute and a half and still going!” Cisco crowed triumphantly. “Smashed the old record.”

“That’s what getting drunk is for,” Caitlin patiently explained. “So you regret the hangover more than the singing,” she giggled, leaning into Betsy more than was friendly, but not so much that she couldn’t blame it on the alcohol. Dammit. Cisco’s work was not over yet.

Once at the stage, they settled on Tribute - mainly because Cisco didn’t have time to talk Caitlin into anything better before Betsy finished sobering up - and it was awesome. Well, okay, mostly awesome. He’d forgotten how much Caitlin couldn’t carry a tune, and Betsy sobered up twenty seconds in and mostly mumbled her way through the rest. But two minutes and forty-eight seconds was an epic record, and they had actually sung it. So that was pretty awesome.

“If I wasn’t hungover right now, Cisco,” Betsy mumbled against the arm she was resting on the bar, “I would be forced to kill you.”

“If I get you some water, will you be less likely to kill me because you feel better or will you just start killing me faster?” Cisco asked. “Because in that case you can get your own water.”

“That was fun,” Caitlin beamed-slash-slurred. “I sang.”

“For a given value,” Betsy mumbled into her arm - at least, that was what Cisco was pretty sure she said - but Caitlin didn’t seem to notice. The bartender appeared with a cup of water that Betsy made vanish, and it only took another ten seconds for their resident metahuman to shake it off. “Ooof. That was a terrible idea. But kinda fun, too, so I guess you can live.”

“Yay. Life is pretty good right now, I’d hate to bail.” Cisco grinned. “And some of the best fun is a terrible idea. Like rocket packs.”

“Oh no.” Caitlin put both hands down on the table. “You are not starting back up about rocket packs.”

“But I figured out how to make pants heat resistant up to three thousand degrees fahrenheit,” he whined. “And you agreed that the fins on the helmet wouldn’t exceed human neck strength, even in hard banking.”

“I am not test-piloting rocket packs, Cisco. Even for you.” Betsy downed another glass of water, then stood up with a set, determined look on her face. “Now, if you’ll both excuse me, I have to go regain my honor. No, don’t try to stop me - I don’t see that I have any choice.”

Then she started for the karaoke line like one of the samurai out of those Netflix movies he only ever watched late at night for some reason.

“Huh?” he asked intelligently.

“I think she’s actually a pretty good singer,” Caitlin explained carefully. “And, let’s face it, I’m really, really not, and you’re not great either. Not bad, but not great,” she amended, and he figured he’d give it to her since it was, after all, an accurate statement. “And she wants to go and be good without us holding her back. Huh. I wonder if that’s why she turns off the transponder so much.”

The doctor’s facial expression was heading south into Deep Melancholy and Cisco shook his head to try to cut it off. “No, no, that’s not it at all, we’re a team, we work well together, I think she just wants some quiet time sometimes,” he said, and wondered if any of it was true. Whether it was or not, it seemed to keep Caitlin from going full emo, so he counted it a win.

“If you want this,” Betsy started singing, and damn, he could see why she wanted to go alone. She was good. “If you want this, you’re going to have to ask nicely, please.” Okay, that was good and also delivered sexily. Like, he was starting to get uncomfortable, sexy. Because there was his science ‘bro’ slash wicked awesome test pilot slash super hero, and she was holding the mic and swaying her hips a little bit like she was trying to talk the mic into doing things that were strictly against the law to do in a public venue. And yeah, sure, she had more of a butch thing going on and he was really more of a girls in sundresses kind of guy, but he was a guy and taste only had so much to do with it.

The only mercy was that her eyes were closed. Probably for her own benefit more than anyone else’s, but it gave Cisco back some face and he appreciated it all the same.

“I’ll give it to you slowly, ‘till you’re just begging me to hold you,” Betsy husked, pulling the mic a little closer than he was strictly comfortable with, and the way her voice got all throaty made his brain skip the next few words - okay, maybe more than a few - and when he tuned back in on the next bit he had to repeat it back to himself in his head to make sure he hadn’t misinterpreted something.

_Your mouth waters, stretched out on my bed; your hands are trembling and your heart is heavy and red and your head is bent back, and your back is arched; my hand is under there, holding you up._

No, he was pretty sure he hadn’t misheard that. And Betsy’s eyes weren’t closed anymore, either.

Caitlin, right next to him, had red in her cheeks, mouth hanging partway open, eyes dark and wide and staring right back at Betsy. She was breathing kind of heavily - not really obviously, but noticeable for someone right next to her and who spent a lot of time with her in normal mode.

This was not normal mode. This was his co-worker probably - no, _definitely_ \- creaming her pantines. Over Betsy’s song about lesbian sex. Really hot lesbian sex, so of course it would get her wet, though if she still didn’t get the memo about Betsy’s interest in her he was going to have to start drinking a whole lot more.

“This is where I want to live, right between your hips,” came another line, and that’s where Cisco drew his.

“Excuse me,” he muttered, holding his jacket in front of himself. “Bathroom.” Caitlin didn’t notice, thankfully.

They were so getting thrown out for this.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song, for the curious, is Melissa Ferrick's "Drive." And yes, people actually do that on karaoke machines. How that doesn't count as an act of public indecency, we don't know.


	4. Chapter 4

_Elizabeth Nora Allen, you have got to be the most ridiculous person in the entire world. Not only do you get up in front of a bar full of people and sing Melissa Ferrick right in front of the girl you’re working a thing for, but then you get cold feet and walk around for a week pretending like nothing happened. And yeah, sure, it would be **nice** if she’d say something about it first, but you aren’t doing yourself any good at all by being a hundred and seventy four centimeters of bright yellow chicken._ Hands shoved in her pockets, Betsy wandered the distance from the Shed - Cisco’s third draft nickname for the area in which she stored her equipment - back to the main lab annex at a sluggish meter a second. She didn’t want to leave, she was nervous about staying, and she was just about as sick of herself as she’d been since the last week she’d spent angsting over whether Iris was actually going to go out with Stephen Truscott.

“Ugh.” Caitlin was stretching in her chair and rubbing her temples. “I liked the rogue meta-humans better when they came one at a time,” she grumbled, checking several pieces of lab equipment in succession. “I am done with running five tests at a time.” She looked up at Betsy. “Do you know any grad students? I hear those are good for grunt work.”

“I could go troll campus for some cute young thing eager to fetch your coffee and manage your testing,” Betsy said, and then wished she could kick herself in the shins. _You are such an idiot._

Caitlin laughed it off, but when Betsy slowed time to get a closer look at her expression, there was uneasiness there. Like she wasn’t quite sure what to do with the information, or Betsy herself. Or maybe she was just overanalyzing. You could do a lot of that when you could basically stop time.

 _Stop it._ She put herself back in the one-second-per-second world and leaned over to look at the machines. “I’m not a total amateur. If you want some help....”

“Well, I guess you can catch any mistakes before they really mess up the results, can’t you,” Caitlin said, then smiled - warm, sure, no reservations this time. “If you could start the electrophoresis, I can work on the mitochondrial test.”

“The STR didn’t work out for our mystery underground berserker?” Betsy tried to shove down the memory of the mess she’d found that sample in. “Maybe it’s a sign that someone ought to clean down there more often.”

“It’s either that, or the perp is a gorilla,” Caitlin sighed. “I hate it when tests give me ridiculous results.”

“Because you don’t know anymore if it’s an error or if the world got a little more impossible today than it seemed to be yesterday?” Betsy checked the numbers twice and did not, did not, did not look at Caitlin’s face again. Even at superspeed.

“Pretty much.”

It took another ten minutes or so of finishing, starting, or double-checking tests for Caitlin to be satisfied enough to finally stand up. “Okay. That is more than enough of that. We can see what’s what in the morning.”

Betsy took a quick detour to the break room and came back with Caitlin’s coat, scarf and bag. Held them out. Quirked a little grin. “Straight from the closet. No detours.”

Caitlin huffed a tired laugh and took her things. “Thanks.” She looked like she was maybe about to say something else, but didn’t. If Betsy made it another week without going completely insane, it would be a miracle.

“You want anything else?” Impulsive, stupid question, but there she was asking it anyway. While holding the door, no less.

Caitlin looked up at her with what was obviously feigned nonchalance. “You could walk me home,” she offered lightly.

Betsy bounced up and down, covered her mouth to keep from shouting, ran three laps around the building and was still grinning like an idiot when she caught the door before it could close. “Not to put a damper on that thought, which is amazing,” she said in what was very carefully not a rush, “but didn’t you drive into work today? Because I’m happy to walk - or run - you home, but then I’d better bring you back in the morning....”

Caitlin’s mouth snapped closed and a vivid blush stained her cheeks. “I, um. Right. Why don’t we drive back, and then go for a walk around my neighborhood,” she managed, doing a great impression of someone trying to forget the last minute had ever happened.

“That sounds good. And Caitlin?” She reached out and touched her fingertips to the other woman’s, just for a moment, and smiled the way she really wanted to. “I’d very much like to walk you home some time. There’s probably somewhere in your neighborhood we could hang out. So rain check?”

“Yeah. That sounds good.” She closed her eyes, squinched up her face in a really adorable way, and then let out a long breath. “Okay. This is nothing. Cisco says way more embarrassing things on a regular basis.” She opened her eyes, smiling ruefully up at Betsy. “But if you speak of this to anyone, ever....”

“Never a word.” Betsy brushed her hand over her heart and tried to ignore the way it was hammering in her chest. “I wouldn’t dare.”

“Better not,” Caitlin smiled in an almost predatory way, and that did things to Betsy’s insides that she’d really, really missed. She didn’t really do casual, and it’d been a while.... Then Caitlin started walking towards the parking garage, and she fell in next to her. “I know about your loyalty to Jitters, but there’s a great little coffee shop a couple blocks from my place. A lot of local musicians play there.”

“Sounds like a party to me.” Betsy waited for the click of the remote unlocking the car, then zipped around and opened the door. “It turns out I have a lot of free time in the evenings when I’m not chasing bad guys around.”

Giving the open door an amused-yet-charmed look, Caitlin nodded in agreement. “That’s us. Party animals.”

“If you’re game for getting thrown out of another bar, Doctor Snow, you can be sure I am.” Betsy shut the door and started around, grinning to herself. She was pretty sure Caitlin was blushing, but she didn’t check.

It was easier not to obsess about the clock and the board position when you were pretty sure you were winning.


	5. Chapter 5

“So that’s when I tell him that if he wants the microscope, he can have it, but he should know that if he’s planning to use it to find his prick, the slides are going to hurt pretty bad. He takes a swing at me, I take a swing back.” Shoulders hunched a little against the December chill, Betsy Allen grinned. “I had some pretty impressive bruises, but he was walking funny for a couple of days. The principal was beside herself, but the microscope made it.”

Caitlin laughed. “Wow. Do you think the time you spent with a black eye was greater than, less than or equal to the number of hours you spent in the principal’s office?”

“Do I get to pick an age range, or do I have to go birth to present? Because I was only getting pulled into the principal’s office for a certain number of years.”

They turned off Hudson, leaving the bright shopping-season lights behind for the more delicate golden halos of Roosevelt’s streetlamps, and Betsy affected a deeply thoughtful expression.

“Include the police commissioner and the CCU dean of students,” Caitlin suggested.

Betsy drew it out another minute or so, then snapped her fingers. “Nope, I think the eyes still have it. Unless you throw in Captain Singh. Then I think office time probably wins by a whisker.”

“Delinquent,” the doctor teased, elbowing the hands-down strangest co-worker she’d ever had. “Make for great stories, though. My life was pretty boring before.”

“I don’t believe that for a minute. I bet you got into all kinds of crazy science trouble in college like, I don’t know, cloning a telepathic gorilla or something. You probably just can’t talk about it because your secret society of mad scientists swore you to secrecy on pain of a severe tickling. I’m on to you, though, and eventually I’ll get it all out of you if it’s the last thing I....”

A gun clicked - revolver, small frame, maybe a .357 - and a guy whose complexion said thirties and street and probably meth stepped out of the alley and did his very best to shout intimidatingly at them without letting his voice carry. “Wallets. Keys. Phones. Right now!”

Her guts clenching, Caitlin froze with a hand on Betsy’s arm, heart pounding like it could escape without the rest of her. No one else was on the block except for the three of them, and the doctor wished she had some Mace in her purse because the only other thing she could think of in her panic was to just give the man what he wanted and she hated, _hated_ that thought.

Next to her, Betsy started laughing.

“You think this is funny, dyke? You think I won’t shoot you and your lipstick girl here?” The man waved the gun dramatically, and Betsy just laughed harder.

“Of all the people in the whole city, you stick us up. Oh my God, you are the least lucky person in the whole world. That woman who won the lottery twice? You are the opposite of her. Go sleep it off, man. Seriously.” Betsy managed to straighten herself up and smother herself down to shoulder-shaking chuckles. “There’s a pretty good shelter up on 83rd - I can give you directions.”

Fully expecting to be shot - she didn’t know offhand how fast a bullet traveled but Betsy had gotten punched plenty of times since the lightning and she didn’t exactly look on her guard at the moment - Caitlin opened her mouth to say something, anything to defuse the situation.

The mugger, in language Caitlin wouldn’t have repeated to a stone, suggested he might shoot Betsy and teach Caitlin how to appreciate men. Betsy’s face turned hard.

Both of them vanished.

Whirling around while her brain berated her for the uselessness of the action, Caitlin put her back to a wall and stood breathing hard. She should call Cisco and Dr. Wells. Not that they had any way of contacting Betsy at the moment - her cell phone couldn’t really track reception at speeds over 100 mph - and that would just get Wells angry and Cisco worried, but at the very least maybe the engineer could come pick her up.

_Allen, I swear to God I am going to store all my instruments in the freezer for the next month if you get yourself shot._

“Hey,” Betsy Allen said beside her. “Sorry about that. Had to run to the station.”

Caitlin screamed and jumped about two meters into the air. “Jesus! Are you okay?”

“Um... yeah.” Betsy eased back a step or two and put both hands up. “I’m fine. Dandy. A little peckish. You seem a little, ah....”

“Like a guy with a gun just threatened to rape and murder us and you disappeared and then scared the crap out of me? Yeah! I’m a little -” she waved her arms in the air for emphasis, “upset, Betsy.” The freezer was looking pretty good about now.

“Um,” Betsy mumbled eloquently, “I’m sorry? For startling you. Yeah. I’m sorry for startling you.”

A hand on her chest, Caitlin started a breathing exercise. “Apology accepted. I just...just give me a minute.” When she held her hands in front of her, they were shaking. “Okay. This is just adrenaline. I’ll have a crash but it shouldn’t be too bad. Yeah.”

“Hey.” Slowly - very slowly - Betsy reached out and wrapped her deft, steady hands around Caitlin’s. Held them. Smiled. “Hey. You’re okay. We’re both okay. I’ve got your back, Caitlin Snow.”

And there was that damn smile. The one that did unprofessional things to Caitlin’s insides and impinged on her brain function. “I know,” she smiled back. “So he’s in police custody now?”

“He felt a burning need to turn himself in. It may have had something to do with how many walls I almost ran us into on the way there. Either way, the police have the gun and a written statement of what actually happened.” Betsy’s palms rubbed lightly against hers, and the damn smile got a little bit impish. “Also, he may be missing his pants.”

Caitlin just stared at Betsy for a moment, and then she burst out laughing. “You touched them? Disgusting!”

“In my defense, I wore gloves.” Betsy grinned enormously. “Never leave home without them.”

“Oh my God,” the doctor gasped between gales of laughter. “Oh my God.”

“Well, usually I go by Betsy. But if you like that sort of thing, I could get used to it.”

Caitlin only laughed harder. “And modest!”

“But of course.” Betsy let go of one of her hands to bow with a flourish. “Only the best for my girl, even if she doesn’t wear lipstick.”

Leaning against the wall for support, Caitlin gave the best dryly inquiring look she could manage while her laughter slid into a fit of giggling. “Just for that, you owe me a milkshake.”

“Sure. Any flavor you want,” Betsy said, still holding one hand, and instead of dancing away laughing, the words seemed to just sit in the air and thicken it until it was hard to breathe.

“Um.” Caitlin swallowed, caught. “Sure. Yeah. That sounds...nice.” The part of her brain that was trying to return everything to normal was babbling about trauma-bonding and how dating her co-worker slash patient slash research subject was a terrible idea, but the rest of her was thinking about the curve of Betsy’s mouth and the possibility of kissing it.

“Nice?” Betsy said, finger loosening around Caitlin’s but not quite letting go. Her face closed, and her eyes hurt to look at. “Well, it’s a milkshake. I think those are supposed to be nice, as long as they don’t involve bananas.”

The shuttering on Besty’s emotions made Caitlin’s throat feel tight. “So there’s still enough adrenaline sloshing around my brain that I’m actually going to say this but feel free to pretend I didn’t,” she found herself saying, “but I like the idea of us dating and I’m sorry if I misread your interest.”

She was still getting the last word out when Betsy’s free hand came up to cup her face and then she was very distinctly up against the wall and being kissed by Betsy Allen, which was not according to plan but that infuriating, enticing mouth was on hers and Caitlin hummed in her throat.

Her hands found their way under Betsy’s jacket, somehow, and tracing the well-toned curve of her waist, but that was still secondary to the kissing - to sucking Betsy’s bottom lip into her mouth, running her tongue along the taller woman’s lips, biting gently into her tongue. Betsy growled into her mouth, a low raw sound of unabashed desire, and the hand on her face found its way to the back of her neck. Which was abruptly rather less distracting than where Betsy’s knee had found its way to.

“That escalated quickly,” Caitlin breathed into Betsy’s ear. She didn’t move her hands.

Betsy groaned into her mouth. “You smell like lemons and spice and it makes me absolutely crazy. I’ve been going out of my mind since probably even before I woke up from my coma, so can we maybe go somewhere private before I risk a public indecency charge here in the street?”

“My place,” the doctor offered. “This time I’m inviting you.”

There was a general wooshing sensation, and Caitlin found herself on the stoop of her apartment building. “Wow.” Betsy was looking smug. “There. That. Your smirk,” Caitlin said, leaning up to kiss it. “And your smiles. I can’t work when I can see them.”

“Work, not exactly what I had in mind,” Betsy whispered into the kiss, pressing her into the door and guiding Caitlin’s hand into her purse. “Keys.”

“Impatient,” Caitlin tsked, smirking herself. “Maybe we should get dinner first.”

“I will die right here on your doorstep,” Betsy threatened between kisses, hand impertinently friendly against her thighs.

Laughing into Betsy’s mouth, Caitlin did finally get her keys out. The instant the door was unlocked there was another blur of the world around her and she was in the hallway outside her apartment.

“It’s really not fair how hot that is,” she complained, copping a feel of Betsy’s super-athletic ass. “Or that, really. Keys. Right.”

“Right.” Betsy waited through her getting the door open, then shut it - normal speed, even - and then turned back to her with heat in her eyes and that damned smile back on her face. “At the risk of sounding like a total heel, I’m going to vote for just shoving you down on your couch and making you scream your head off. Is that going to be a problem for you, babe?”

“No,” Caitlin agreed, already pushing Betsy’s jacket from her shoulders. She didn’t finish before she was on her back on the sofa. “But don’t call me ‘babe.’”

“You don’t like that one, huh?” Her slacks didn’t keep Betsy’s fingers out for more than a breath or two. There was a moment of sure, slender fingers on the inside of Caitlin’s thigh, and then a thumb sliding over her clit that made her keen a little and hook one leg over the back of the couch. Another moment, another touch opening her folds, and then the raw smooth scrape of Betsy pressing into her. “Baby? Sweetheart? Hot stuff?”

Caitlin made a few breathy vowel sounds, rocking her hips to meet Betsy’s hand, and started trying to get the jacket off again. “Those aren’t terrible,” she managed, though Betsy certainly seemed to know what she was doing and putting words together was getting more and more difficult. “You could tell me more about how I drive you crazy.”

“You bite the end of your pens. Every time you do that, I think about putting my fingers in your mouth. About how fucking hot you’d look up against a wall with my hand against your mouth. It’s so damn unfair.” Betsy’s lips brushed the back of her jaw, the spot behind her ear, and her fingers flexed - but that wasn’t quite the word, either, so much as buzzed.

Caitlin moaned. “Oh, that’s good. Yes, more,” she encouraged, and found Betsy’s free hand. “I may have, um, spent time thinking about the more, oh, personal uses of your abilities,” she confessed, nibbling on her lover’s fingers.  

“In detail?” Betsy teased roughly, brushing her thumb over Caitlin’s lower lip firmly.

“Mmm,” she agreed, tongue darting out to taste Betsy’s skin. “Like how fast you could get me out of my clothes - you’d be standing close and we’d be having a moment and then you’d smirk at me and whoosh, I’d be naked in the lab and yes yes yes right there oh my god don’t stop.”

“And we’d be testing the load-bearing tolerances of your tables?” Betsy husked, voice so low it was almost just vibration against Caitlin’s ear.

“Absolutely,” the doctor breathed, arching her back. By now her coordination was almost completely gone and she had to give up on getting Betsy’s jacket off. Instead, she pushed her hands under the meta-human’s shirt and found her lover’s waist, the long line of her spine, the pulse just over her navel. “I mean, they’re all rated for five hundred pounds, but you can never be sure about quality control these days.”

Betsy laughed into her jaw and bit against her pulse, pressing the tight hard urgency of her weight down over Caitlin as her fingers sped up even further - Caitlin enjoyed a strong vibrator as much as the next girl, but nothing in her toychest had the kind of horsepower Betsy Allen’s fingers were working out on her right now, much less the kind of precise and intelligent finger-fu.

“Betsy! Fuck!” Caitlin swore, nails dug into her lover’s back, her moan building with her orgasm, probably yelling something incoherent as it overtook her and shorted out what felt like every last damn nerve ending. She felt lit up like a supernova, overwhelmed but still somehow whole and able to perceive it.

She was just getting her breath back when Betsy eased back enough to look down into her eyes, a rare moment of nervous excitement spilling into her speedster’s smile. “You okay, baby?”

Caitlin felt that little piece of emotion all the way down in the center of her being, and answered by taking her lover’s face in both hands and kissing her with deep, passionate attention to detail. She wanted to remember perfectly every movement of Betsy’s tongue and lips, every taste, every hum of pleasure and catch of breath.

“Way better than okay.”

Betsy Allen didn’t do goofy. This was about as solid a rule of nature as the sun rising in the morning, gravity pulling toward mass and the speed of light. But that was really the only word for the delighted expression on her face when Caitlin finally finished that kiss. “Wow.”

Caitlin indulged in a smug grin. “So,” she said, finally getting the right angle to start peeling the damn jacket off Betsy’s toned shoulders, “I totally respect your personal boundaries, but I really, really hope you aren’t a stone butch.”

Betsy blinked a couple of times, like she was still trying to get her brain to work, then pulled herself up onto the back of the couch and started undoing her belt. “It depends on my mood, but I’m going to have to go with no at the moment.”

“Good.” Caitlin smiled around the teeth she pressed into Betsy’s throat and laved her tongue over the skin in her mouth. The sharp, raw sound that vibrated under her lips sounded like it started somewhere in the core of Betsy’s chest. Taking it as encouragement - and realizing that any marks she left would be gone in moments - Caitlin bit and sucked her way down Betsy’s throat. She had to pause to get her lover’s T-shirt off, but not for very long, and then she continued her way down.

When she sucked a nipple into her mouth, Betsy dug fingers that weren’t entirely gentle into her hair and squirmed against the couch in a way that was decidedly impatient. Caitlin chuckled into her skin, gave both of Betsy’s breasts a parting squeeze, and continued her way down.

By the time she got to Betsy’s waist, the beat-up jeans were crumpled on the floor next to Caitlin’s slacks. If she’d cared about such things at the moment, she would have reviewed the past few minutes in her mind to see if she could figure out when, exactly, Betsy had divested her of them. But Betsy Allen was sitting on her couch with her legs open and only a pair of thin microfiber shorts between Caitlin and her goal.

Betsy’s scent was undeniably female, but muskier than Caitlin’s. The doctor hooked her fingers in the waistband of the runner’s underwear, looked up to meet her eyes, and then the shorts were gone too, presumably also on the floor.

“That’s very convenient,” Caitlin remarked.

“You look really pretty staring up like that, too,” Betsy chuckled. “I’d say I could look at you forever like that, but my self-discipline isn’t actually that good.”

“You get credit for the thought, though,” the doctor smiled, resting her chin on Betsy’s thigh. “And time can be longer for you anyway, right?”

What might have been a snarky reply started fine, but then Caitlin leaned forward and found Betsy’s clit with her tongue, and the words became a drawn-out moan. The sound and the feel of her lover under her mouth made Caitlin dig her fingers into Betsy’s hips as she worked, and soon the way Betsy’s nails raked her shoulders told her exactly how urgently needed her attention was. Betsy wasn’t vocal - what sounds she made were mostly low, sharp, urgent little gasps and intakes of breath - but the way her body shuddered and bucked under Caitlin’s touch was as eloquent as any words could have been. _I want you. I need you. Please._ The doctor put as much strength as she could into her tongue as she licked into Betsy. It seemed like she could taste the pulses and shudders as well as feel them, and soon she was moaning again. Betsy’s hips were rocking against her face, now, and she could tell the other woman was close.

“Caitlin,” Betsy whispered, as if her name was something too precious to handle roughly. “Caitlin.”

Already electrified with the way the other woman wanted her, everything but giving Betsy pleasure fell away from the doctor’s mind. One long, final sweep of her tongue and she fastened her lips around Betsy’s clit and sucked hard.  Betsy’s hands dug into her shoulders and the whole line of Betsy’s body arched convulsively, vibrating so sharply that it rattled Caitlin’s teeth a little; almost before it started it was over, and both of them were laid flat on the couch with Betsy’s arms rib-groaningly tight around her.

“I could use some more lung capacity, sexy,” she said after a while.

“Sorry.” Betsy eased up almost immediately, burying a chuckle in Caitlin’s hair. “Guess you can’t really run away from me anyway.”

“Not that you’re a creepy stalker or anything,” the doctor laughed. “God. I haven’t done that since undergrad.”

“Was she pretty hot?” In a classically Betsy-like bit of frying-pan-to-fire, her lover accelerated past the awkward phrasing and jumped on her past sexual history instead.

“Smoking. Half-French, half-Puerto Rican. And her hands, god. The things she could do with velcro straps.”

“Well, fuck,” Betsy whistled, eyes dancing with mischief. “Think she’d go for a threesome?”

Caitlin laughed again. “Probably not. I think she married someone on the women’s Olympic skiing team.” She squeezed Betsy tight for a moment. “So, do I have any chance of keeping up with you, or do I need to release you into the wild?”

“Don’t joke,” Betsy whispered, sliding a hand up to Caitlin’s cheek and fixing her with a look that was so raw and open that it hardly seemed to belong on that sweet, roguish face.

The doctor felt some rawness of her own pulling at her eyes. “I’m terrified,” she admitted, and suddenly felt all of it, the cold spikes and creeping dread and fight-or-flight adrenaline for the second time that night. She pressed back into the couch cushions and scrambled for a throw blanket just to have something between her and the air. “I am so fucking scared, Betsy. I really wish it was just sex because caring scares the shit out of me.”

She didn’t make it to the throw blanket, because her comforter was already around her and Betsy on top of her before she got her hand on it. “Hey,” Betsy whispered, tightening her arms again until it hurt a little. “Hey. I’m a bonafide scientific miracle, baby. I’m not going to let anything happen to either of us. You call, I come running, and you know how fast I can do that.”

“I patch you up on a weekly basis,” she pointed out, heart rate slowed somewhat. “Sometimes more than patching. But you can’t stop being a hero and I can’t make myself stop caring about you - believe me, I’ve tried. So I’m just screwed no matter what and I might as well enjoy being with you until one of us gets killed but it’s always going to scare me.”

“Yeah. Just like I’m going to be waiting every day for something impossible and unstoppable to come out of nowhere and take you away from me for no goddamn reason. But living is better than hiding, right?” Betsy tilted her head up again, eyes full of so much hurt and so much courage that it made Caitlin tear up all over again, and then kissed her until neither of them could breath without gasping.

She had to admit that the kissing helped dampen her fear to manageable levels. Comfortable levels, even. The look in Betsy’s eyes that promised more sex in the near future was also a plus.

“I love you,” Caitlin told her with another kiss.

Betsy’s grin was impish again, which was also reassuring. “Considering that you’ve lured me into your home and debauched me, doctor, you’d better!”

“Lured?” Caitlin poked Betsy in the ribs. “You’re the one who carried me, speedy.”

“Lured,” Betsy insisted, undaunted. “With your wiles. I swear.”

“Mm-hm.” The doctor rolled her eyes, then let them drop to the side God, she didn’t want to ask, it felt so stupidly needy. But she did need to know.

She didn’t even get her mouth open around a first word.

“Yeah,” Betsy whispered. “Of course I do.”

Caitlin felt herself smiling. If Betsy couldn’t say it now, she could wait. About, oh, a month. After that, steps would need to be taken.

“I’m not in trouble already, am I?”

“You? I’m impressed you lasted this long,” Caitlin smirked. Then frowned; her arm did not appreciate being smashed against the back of the couch for so long. “Bed. Then you can try to dig your way out.”

“Yes’m. Should I bring you something from the kitchen while I”m at it?” Betsy snarked cheerfully.

“I’m good for now. You should eat, though. There’s some pizza from last night.”

And then she was in her bed, still wrapped in the comforter. Half a moment later, Betsy appeared next to her, breath smelling faintly of mouthwash. “Pizza and sex? I’ll get spoiled at this rate.”

“Don’t worry,” Caitlin said into Betsy’s shoulder. “I like to eat healthy most of the time. There’s plenty of kale and quinoa in your future.”

“Well, all right. Just the sex, then.” The light flicked off without Betsy appearing to leave the bed, and the speedster was grinning into her mouth when she kissed her. “Somehow I’ll endure.”


End file.
